Hi Carson
Thanks for sharing.
And glad to hear you are home safe from the retreat, if not quite grounded yet
I know very well the sensations you are describing, the minty feeling stayed with me for years and it would occur anywhere in the vicinity of the spinal nerve and the GI tract. I could "taste it" in my heart, the belly, the back, the head. Occationally it can still be here - usually in my chest. It is like having taste buds everywhere.
Breathing through the cells of the body is also a common experience here. It is not really breathing air, it is breathing the prana component in it.
Before becoming properly grounded through my shift (back from cloud 9) in Ireland last summer I would daily experience myself existing without breathing physical air. This would happen also when I was walking/hiking...the body seemed to do fine without air, just prana. However - it was a strain on my lungs, the "existing on prana" had me poorly grounded and I would easily slip into extatic states and stay there for days. I would often have a dry asthmatic cough because of it.
So regarding your experiences I have only one sharing:
No matter how ecstatic, weird or blissfull it is, it is still just scenery. From my own mistakes of paying it to much attention over the years, or not taking the signs of this particular type of overload/ungroundedness seriously, I learned the hard way that the energy component in the "waking up to ourselves as we are"-process is not to be regarded as a "high degree of enlightenment" - it is simply just something that happens on the way.
The real essence/ongoing/ evolving result of the path is something completely different and much more down to earth. It is not ours to have.
It is simply ordinary wise actions for the benefit of all. In order for this to reach its full potential, all the rest has to be let go of.
I am not saying you are not doing that, in fact I know the letting go is happening as you write your sharing, thanks so much for taking the time to share.
My heart goes out.......to everyone really........ because I know how tempting it is to make these experiences something to ponder or otherwise get "sanely" lost in. Don't. Simply take the signs of excess energy/ symptoms/being "high" as a message to either cut down on practices and/or make sure you ground.
Maybe walk your lovely lively dogs, hug your forest, dance with Amrita, do the dishes, be with D.
Big hug
Katrine
PS. The belly thing...here....the sensation of too much energy (there is always more...and still more) is still slowly (or not so slowly) changing into more and more presence being the main component in the "sensation" of the ongoing flow. In other words, in my experience..all the energy
symptoms become less and less prominent, and the main power is the presence...no matter where in the body it seems to manifests (as energy moving) to a greater degree. So...no matter how ecstatic, if I do not allow myself to focus on it, I am able to stay fully conscious and still through it all. The presence allows for more wisdom to come through. If I am still I can constantly hear it, if I am moving with the energy...I get lost in it. So stay here. Stay home.
